Airbnb Ate Up 10% Of NYC’s Available Rentals In 2015

“Airbnb hosts in New York City who take advantage of the platform by illegally renting out entire apartments for at least three months each year took about 10% of the city’s available rentals off of the market in 2015, according to a report out this week from a duo of affordable housing nonprofits.

‘Airbnb’s own data demonstrates that the illegal short term listings of residential units on its site exacerbate the acute affordable housing crisis that plagues our city,’ said Marti Weithman, a supervising attorney for MFY Legal Services…This week’s report also found that more than half of 2015 Airbnb listings, about 56%, violated the Multiple-Dwelling Law, which prohibits New Yorkers from renting out entire apartments for under 30 days at a time if the tenant on the lease is not present. This finding is in line with Airbnb’s own December 2015 data dump.

At the neighborhood level, the report shows that impact listings are concentrated in Manhattan and Brooklyn, from 599 in the East Village to 105 in Fort Greene. The table below shows what percentage of potential rentals in these neighborhoods were lost to Airbnb. In Crown Heights, for example, Airbnb hosts allegedly withheld 12% of available rentals.